Alright, this morning we're going
to look at that passage that Brother Robert read on the warfare
of grace. The life of a believer. We can
talk about it so many ways, so many different facets, so many
different contexts. And one of the major ways that
the Bible describes the life of a true believer, a sinner
saved by grace, living in this world, is that it's a warfare,
it's a battle. And it's an everyday battle.
It's not just one time. And we are to war against the
flesh. And when we say the flesh, understand
what we're talking about is ourselves. We're not talking about just
some little devil running on the inside of us. We are the problem. And we do
have the Spirit of God within us if we're saved, if we're sinners
saved by grace. We do have a new life within
us. The life of God, the life of
Christ within us. That's what some people call
the new nature and that's okay. You don't go too far with it.
We have godly desires and we have evil desires. And they war
against each other within us. And so that's an everyday thing. It doesn't let up. Somebody asked
me one time, says, well, when does it end? When we die. That's
when it ends. Because then this vile body,
this body which is dead, will be put to the dust. And it's
not just the physical aspect of us, there's nothing sinful
about our physical bodies necessarily. Our physical bodies show the
effects of sin, that's why we age and why we get sick, all
of these things. This body, as I said, is dead
because of sin. This Holy Spirit is life because
of righteousness, and that's Christ. But we live in a world of evil,
We're surrounded by enemies. Right here in Ephesians chapter
6, verse 10, listen to what Paul the Apostle says to the believers
at Ephesus. He says, finally, my brethren,
be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. He says,
put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand
against the wiles, the deceptions, the trickery, of the devil, the
adversary. That's what the word devil means.
It's the adversary, the accuser. The name Satan has the connotation
of accuser. The word devil has the connotation
of the adversary. He's not our friend. He's our
enemy. Because he's the enemy of Christ,
our Savior. So we're surrounded by these
enemies, Satan, the evil within ourselves, as I've talked about,
the world, constantly tempting us. The religious world too now,
I understand it's not just the immoral world as men and women
see it, but the religious world is against the true gospel, the
true people of God, many of whom call themselves Christian, but
they deny the truth of Christ. And they're against us too, constantly
tempting us, the religious world to us, to compromise the gospel,
to compromise the truth. And so that's what we're up against
now. But look, remember what he said
here, verse 10. Finally, my brethren, be strong,
and here's the key, in the Lord and in the power of his might.
Now whatever strength we have to fight these battles, it's
not our strength. It's not our power. It's not
our might. It's not our own, it's the Lord's.
And think about it, when we think about overcoming Satan, overcoming
death, overcoming the flesh, the victory is gained not by
our strength and our power and our goodness, but by Christ. Remember when he told his disciples,
he said, in the world, you'll have trouble, tribulation, but
be of good cheer, he said, I have overcome the world. Notice what
he said there. He doesn't say like modern religion
tells us. Modern religion would revamp
that statement and put it this way. He'd say, in the world,
you'll have trouble, but be of good cheer, I'm gonna help you
overcome the world. That's not what he said. He's
not gonna help us overcome it. He already has overcome it. When the world, and by nature
we're included with the world, but we've been saved out of the
world, the world put him to death and how did he overcome it? He
arose from the dead. It's kind of like saying I'll
show you. That's what he did. He overcame the world, he overcame
death, he overcame hell. He did it. And our faith is in
him, not in us. He told his disciples, he said,
if the world hates you, marvel not, it hated me, and you're
a follower of me. Our strength to go into this
battle with our hearts and our minds is Christ. And I dealt with this last week. Because in Christ, if I know
Christ now, the only way I know him is by the revelation of God.
God has revealed him. The only way I believe in him
is by the power of God. He's given me that faith to latch
on to Christ and to hang on for dear life, looking unto Jesus,
the author and finisher of my faith. But I know that in Him, that
no matter what I go through here on this earth, what you go through,
if you're a believer now, if you're a child of God, a sinner
saved by grace, and that's what a child of God is, if you're
a saint, that's a sinner saved by grace. Whatever you go through
here on this earth, whether it be what men and women call good
or men and women call bad, our standing before God never changes.
Because we stand before him in Christ, washed in the blood of
Christ and clothed in his righteousness imputed to us. That's right. And our state in this world will
never change. As born again people, the Holy
Spirit will never leave us. That's what he says. We're born
again, we've been given a life that God will never take back.
And though this body is dead, the spirit is life because of
righteousness. And so our struggle is not in our own strength. It's
not in our own power. It's not in our own goodness.
It's not in our own righteousness. It's in the strength, the power,
the goodness, and the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
that's what that means, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, in the
power of his might. Now he's gonna give us some specifics
of what that really means in a minute. But you know this,
here's another thing. To be strong in the Lord is to
have our hearts, our minds, our affections, our wills established,
firmly settled by the Lord in His grace. Being convinced by the Spirit
through the Word that we are the children of God, that we
have a right standing with God by the blood of Christ, that
that cannot be changed because God is always faithful to his
promise. Now we're not always faithful
to our promises. So if the battles in our strength
were goners, but God's always faithful to his promises. And
his promises find their fulfillment and their completion in the Lord
Jesus Christ. So we're convinced that we have
a right standing before God because salvation is by grace and grace
is for sinners. Did you know that? It's not for
the good people. They don't need it. Christ said,
I didn't come to call the righteous to repentance. They don't need
it. Only the sick need the physician. And we're sin sick. And he's
the great physician. Convinced that I have a right
to approach the throne of grace I Love that passage in Hebrews
10 in verse 19 and 20 and 20 where it talks about we have
boldness to enter the throne of grace the holiest of all On
what basis do I have a boldness, liberty to enter into the holy
presence of a holy God who cannot look upon sin? What basis, what
ground, what reason do I have that I can come there boldly,
confidently? The blood of Jesus Christ. That's
it. It's not because you had a good
day today or you prayed a prayer. I talked to a man several weeks
ago who's dying, physically dying. And all he could talk about to
me, sadly, was how much he prayed for everybody. Now, does that
mean we should not pray for everybody? No, we should. We should pray,
especially for our brothers and sisters in Christ. Pray for our
families. We even pray for our enemies,
scripture says. But my friend, my confidence,
my assurance is not in how much I pray. My confidence and my
assurance is in Christ, the Lord of righteousness. I spoke about
him this morning, the son of righteousness, who cometh with
healing in his wings. That's our hope. And then our enemy, think about
this, Satan is our enemy, we said, the flesh is our enemy,
And Satan is the great deceiver, the devil. He works in the minds
of people to deceive them mainly. Now listen to this. If you read
your Bibles, I believe you'll see this is true. Satan works
in the minds of our enemies mainly to deceive them with false religion. I heard an old preacher say one
time, he said, Satan would much rather have you in a church,
in a pew where the gospel is not preached, than he would have
you in the local bar laying drunk. And that shocks some people.
Does that mean it's okay to go down to the local bar and lay
drunk? No! But you see, Satan is a deceiver. He works with
the deceivableness of unrighteousness. The mystery of iniquity. He deceives
people with false hope, false religion, salvation based on
works, conditioned on sinners. Just like that man who told me
he was confident that he was going to die and go to heaven
because he prayed. Now I gotta tell you, I'm not
trying to be mean, I'm not trying to upset people, but that is
satanic. I am a praying man. You are praying
people. But I'm telling you, your prayers
are not gonna make you right with God. Only Christ can do
that, His grace. Our warfare is not earthly and
it's not to be fought with physical weapons. That's why I read that
second Corinthians passage. The weapons of our warfare are
not carnal. When you read history, even church history, I want you
to know that every time a person or a group of people or a denomination
went to war with physical weapons, swords, guns, whatever, In the
name of Jesus Christ, it was a false Christ. And they were
liars and deceivers and they were deceived themselves. The
Crusades, you ever read about the Crusades? It was satanic. Christ never, never told his
people to take up the sword of steel or the gun and fight his
battles. Now I know if you go back to
the Old Testament, you'll see Israel doing a lot of things,
but that's not Christianity, folks. That's the Jews under
the law trying to survive. And we can talk about that later
on. You remember when they came to
arrest the Lord in the garden? Peter picked up the sword and
cut off one man's ear. Christ picked the ear up and
put it back on him. He said, put up your sword, Peter.
And then, you know what he did? He turned around to those men,
he said, who do you seek? And they said, we seek Jesus of Nazareth. And he said, I am. That's really
what he said. He didn't say, I am he. He just
said, I am. That's God's name, I am. You
remember what happened to them? They fell back just at his word. And then he said, now come and
take me. They had to have his permission to arrest him. He don't need your guns and your
swords. I'm not advocating anything about what we have to deal with
on earth. I'm talking about in the gospel, in the warfare of
grace. In this warfare of grace, you
know where the battlefield is? It's in the mind and in the hearts
of people. That's where it is. Our weapons
are found in God's word. Our weapons are aimed at the
destruction of particular fortresses. Remember, I'll just read it to
you again. Verse five of 2 Corinthians 10. Here's the battlefield. Casting down imaginations, thoughts,
ideas, reasonings. We wanna cast them down. We don't
go after them. And every high thing that exalteth itself against
the knowledge of God." Anything that is not submitted to the
knowledge of God as He reveals Himself, we want to bring down. And we pray, Lord, bring it down
in ourselves. And bringing into captivity every thought to what?
The obedience of Christ. I believe that's translated properly,
too. The obedience of Christ. You see, it's about who he is,
and what he did, and what he gives, and what he says. And so with that in mind, Paul
writes in verse 12, for we wrestle not against flesh and blood.
You can take a gun, put it to a person's head, and get a false
profession out of them, but that's what you've got, a false profession.
But we wrestle against principalities. against powers, against the rulers
of darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high
places. See, that's what we're after
here. We're not after physics. We don't take up guns and tanks
and knives in this warfare. It's a battle of the mind. It's
a battle of the heart. It's a spiritual battle. And so he begins to give the
armor of God. Now listen to this. Number one,
he says in verse 13, we have foretaken to you the whole armor
of God, that you may be able to withstand the evil day, having
done all to stand. What is that evil day? It's any
day you're in this battle. And you want to stand. What is
our standing? It's in Christ. And so number
one, he says in verse 14, stand there for having your loins girt
about with truth. Our first issue here in this
battle, that's the first part of the armor mentioned because
it's the foundation of all the rest. If what I'm preaching to
you is not true, what good's it gonna do you? If in dealing with people in
this world, dealing with myself even, if what I say or what I
imagine isn't true, how am I gonna know if it's true? Well, truth
is in Christ. He said, I am the way, the truth,
and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. It's the truth that is revealed
to us by God. It has to do with the gospel.
Gospel truth. We're talking about salvation.
We're not talking about how to make you rich in this world.
We're not talking about how to heal you physically. We're not
talking about how to have a better life now. We're talking about
how God saves sinners. And that's the foundation of
everything we believe. How God is just to justify ungodly
people like us. And what that is, you take the
soldier, they wore robes back then. Well, if you didn't have
a belt, that's what this girdle of truth is, a belt to snug everything
to, you couldn't fight, you couldn't run. And that's what this truth
does, it holds everything together for us. A person must hear and
know the truth before he can be established in the truth.
Faith must come objectively before it comes subjectively. Faith
comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. Paul wrote, I'm not ashamed of
the Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation
to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first, the Greek also,
or the Gentile, For therein is the righteousness of God revealed,
from faith to faith, from knowledge revealed to knowledge received
by the power of God. It's written that justified shall
live by faith. What is it to be justified? It
means to be forgiven of all my sins, past sins, present sins,
future sins, original sin, whatever you want to call it. Sins of
thought, sins of action, sins of omission, is to be forgiven
of all my sins on one solid ground, the blood of Jesus Christ. That's
to be justified, forgiven. It's to be declared righteous
in the sight of God on one solid ground, the righteousness of
his son freely imputed to me, charged to my account, without
any contribution from myself. standing before God in Christ,
washed in His blood, clothed in His righteousness. That's
what it is. That's how God justifies the
ungodly. God is just to save sinners by
His grace through the blood and righteousness of His Son. Nothing
else added. Nothing taken away. Now when
sinners add things, conditions that they meet, things they do
to that mix, they corrupt it. And we've got to fight that.
And how do we do? We fight it with the truth that
holds everything together. Look over at Ephesians 4, just
back a page. And look at verse 21, he's talking
about learning Christ. In Ephesians 4, he says, if so
be that you have heard him and have been taught by him as the
truth is in Jesus. And what does the name Jesus
mean? He shall save his people from their sins. Having your
loins girded about with, if you don't have this truth, you are
impotent in this battle. You don't have the power of His
might, you don't have the strength of the Lord without this truth. And it's the first thing that
we've got to consider. Do you know the Gospel? The true
Gospel. Not the Gospel that Satan brings
about that's a deception. The Gospel. And then look back
at verse 14 of Ephesians 6. The next piece of this armor
is the breastplate of right, having on the breastplate of
righteousness. And you know the soldier's breastplate,
it protected his vital organs, his heart, his lungs, his stomach,
and it went all the way around. Well, what righteousness is this
talking about? You'd be amazed at how many sovereign
grace commentators, as we call them, will say this, they'll
say well now that can either mean our righteous works or the
imputed righteousness of Christ. Well let me tell you something
about this breastplate of righteousness. Satan and the world and sometimes
self in our bad ways aims the arrows against this breastplate. If you're gonna shoot somebody,
they either go for the head or they go for the heart. We'll
deal with the head in just a minute. Now, if this breastplate of righteousness
is our righteous works, I can tell you right now, Satan can
shoot holes in it. You're not very well protected. You may think at a given moment,
you say, just like the man who was talking about prayer, he
may think that his prayers are perfectly righteous, sinless,
pure, but they're not. How do you know that? Because
I know they fall short of the perfection of righteousness that
can only be found in Christ. You may think you do a good work,
And you may do a good work, but if you think that that's your
righteousness before God, Satan can shoot holes in it. You're
not very well protected. The only place that we can find
the perfection of righteousness, a breastplate that Satan cannot
shoot any holes in, is the imputed righteousness of Christ. Here's what Paul said about it.
Romans 8.33, who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?
It's God that justify. Who can condemn us? It's Christ
that died, yea rather is risen again and is at the right hand
of the Father, ever living to make intercession for us. You
see, that's a righteousness that there's no flaw. There's no chink
in that armor. There's no diminishing of it.
We're saved and eternally secure based upon Christ's righteousness
alone. And Satan can find no flaw in
it. So have on the breastplate of righteousness. Come before
God. Stand against all enemies. Having
on the breastplate of righteousness. And what it means to have it
on is to believe in it, submit to it. Wear it. All right, look at the third.
Third piece there, verse 15. Have your feet shod with the
preparation of the gospel of peace. Now what does that mean? That means be prepared for battle. And notice it doesn't say have
your feet shod with the gospel. That was already dealt with back
up in the girdle of truth. It has have your feet shod with
the preparation of the gospel. What does that mean? Well, here's
what it means. 2 Timothy 2, verse 15. I'll just read these verses to
you. You can write them down. Here's what that means. 2 Timothy
2, 15. Study to show thyself approved
unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing
the word of truth. That's what it means. Study the
word. Here's another verse that tells
you what it means. 1 Peter 3, 15. but sanctify the
Lord God in your hearts and be ready always to give an answer
to every man that asks you a reason of the hope that is in you with
meekness and fear." Be ready. How can I be ready? Study the
Word of God. Arm yourself with the Word of
God. That doesn't mean you have to memorize the Bible from Genesis
to Revelation. But it means you have to know
what the Word of God says about who God is and about who we are
and how God saves sinners and who Christ is. Be a ready soldier. Be ready to walk out into the
battle prepared. Don't be like those in Hebrews
5 who were weak and unskilled because they lacked the exercise. And then look at verse 16. Here's
the next piece of armor. Above all, taking the shield
of faith, wherewith you shall be able to quench all the fiery
darts of the wicked. Now again, remember Satan's gonna
throw his darts, his accusations. The world will throw their accusations.
Self will sometimes accuse. We accuse ourselves, we do that.
What do we need? We need the shield of faith.
Well, what is that faith? Well, we read, I quoted it in
Romans 117, the justified shall live by faith. Now, what does
that mean? That means what the writer of Hebrews wrote in Hebrews
12 too. Running the race of grace, looking
to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. And I want you
to turn to this scripture. Revelation chapter 12. Here's the shield of faith. We
have the breastplate of righteousness, and we continually look unto
Christ as the author and finisher of our faith. That's the shield
of faith. That's walking by faith, looking unto Him, persevering
in the faith, pleading His blood, pleading His righteousness, not
looking to ourselves, Not pleading our own strengths,
but only His. Look at verse 9 of Revelation
12. Now this is a metaphorical description
of Satan attacking the church. And listen to what it says, verse
9. The great dragon, that's Satan, was cast out, that old serpent
called the devil, And Satan, which deceiveth the whole world,
that is the whole lost world, cursed world, he was cast out
into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. And I
heard a loud voice saying in heaven, now has come salvation
and strength and the kingdom of our God and the power of his
Christ. Now you see the strength and
the power here? It has come now, talking about Christ and His
death on the cross and His bear and His resurrection. And it
says, for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which
accused them before God day and night. Remember when Satan accused
Job? The Lord, in His providence,
allowed Satan to come before Him and accuse Job and accuse
others. But now that's over, when Christ
died on that cross. But look at verse 11. That says,
and they overcame him. The brethren overcame him. Years ago, they started a religious
station up in Ashland, Kentucky. And it was false religion. They
called themselves Christian, but it wasn't. But I remember
there were three local preachers on that program, and they had
this cardboard cutout they said was Satan. And they started preaching
against that cardboard cutout. And one of the preachers got
up there and kicked that cardboard cutout and said, that's what
you deserve, devil. And I thought, you fools. Now, does that mean that we can't
overcome the devil? Forget that foolishness. He says
here, the brethren overcame the devil. But how did they do it? Look at verse 11. They overcame
him by the blood of the Lamb. You see it? And it says the word
of their testimony. And they loved not their lives
unto death. What is the word of our testimony? Amen. That's it. Christ. I know Satan could twist me up
in a knot to where I could never survive. But he cannot do one
bit of damage to my Lord and Savior. You understand that? That's what this shield of faith
back here in Ephesians 6 is. The shield of faith wherewith
you shall be able to quench all the fiery darts, spears, arrows
of the wicked. And then look at verse 17. Here's
the next one. And take the helmet of salvation
The helmet of salvation protects the head. What is that talking
about? It's talking about the mind. It's talking about what
we know to be true. And that helmet of salvation
is the assurance and confidence of salvation that we have because
of the word of God in Christ. That's what I know. And why do
I know that? Because God said it. And that
settles it. That's what the helmet of salvation
is. It protects the head, it protects the mind, how we think.
That godly assurance we have from God's word that gives us
confidence in Christ. I know whom I have believed,
Paul said, and I'm persuaded that he's able to keep that which
I've committed unto him against that day. I know that I'm a sinner,
but I also know that I have an advocate with the Father in heaven,
Jesus Christ the righteous. What can wash away my sins? Nothing
but the blood. That's what I know. My hope is
built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. That's
the helmet of salvation. And then he concludes it with
the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Let's be
sure that when we go into this battle, and it's an everyday
battle, that our sword, our weapon, is not our own thoughts, not
our own opinions, not our own ideas, but the Word of God. What does God's Word say? Somebody
comes to me and they say, when I believe salvation is this way,
well, I got to look at them. I say, well, now, that either
is or is not what God's Word says, and I want to show them
where. Somebody come to me one time,
they said, well, I don't believe in that word predestination.
I said, you don't believe in it? He said, no. I said, do you
believe the Bible? He said, every word of it. I
said, well, you've left out that word, because it's in the Bible. What does God's Word say? Whatever
God's Word says, let me tell you something about that. God's
Word is true and right and settled. whether I believe it or not.
I've told you about the sign that I saw up in Huntington,
West Virginia. They said on a church site, God
said it, I believe it, that settles it. That's wrong. God said it,
that settles it, whether I believe it or not. I hope I believe it. I want you to believe it. Well,
Paul deals with prayer here. And I'll deal with that at some
later time. I've run out of time. Understand
now that prayer is worship. It's not a person trying to change
God's mind. The Bible says God knows what
we need and what we want before we even pray for it. Prayer is
bolstered by two things. Number one, We pray on the basis
in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Number two, we pray after
all we've given. It's okay to talk to God and
tell him what you desire. We pray for our sister Eve. We
pray for the people on our prayer list. We pray for good days. But here's the kicker, and it's
a good one. Thy will be done. God blesses us through prayer
because it's worship. It's faith in Him. We're humbling
ourselves to show that He's our Heavenly Father and we're in
His hands. His will be done.